A space dedicated to exploring the key issues, challenges, new research and policy changes affecting working mothers – especially those returning after maternity leave.
You’ll also gain insight into how we think, and a clearer sense of our values and ethos. To learn more, sign up to our mailing list opposite or connect with us on LinkedIn.
Welcome to our monthly blog
This is not a short-term fix; this is a long-term strategy.
The organisations that succeed recognise that supporting working mothers is an investment, not a cost. By creating the right environment for them to thrive, you can retain some of your most experienced, skilled, and valuable employees.
Changing the narrative around who needs ‘support’
What went through your mind preparing to return to work after becoming a parent – first, second, third time? Did you feel conflicted, challenged or even unable to see how to fit back into a system that once felt so comfortable, predictable?
Women‘s rights and the economic need for change
Asking Google about the state of the gender pay gap today, it spat out that while the gap is closing (median disparity being 6.9%, down on 7.1% from 2024 figures), estimations suggest it will take another 40 years to fully eliminate the disparity.
June 2026
Maternal Strengths Report 2026
The evidence is in! Mothers are truly stronger than we all realise - and organisations looking to expand their leadership capacity would do well to pay attention!
I was very lucky to chat with Alexa Starks, author of The Maternal Strengths Report 2026 - published this month by her company, Mothered Media.
You can read the full report by clicking on the link above, and you can listen here to a short conversation about what she found, what the main implications of her findings were, and what organisations can think and do differently to harness - and retain - the incredible leadership skill and value of a woman employee who has been learning how to parent.
One of her key recommendations is a total rethink about the return to work phase of a woman’s career after a maternity leave, and to think of the time away from the business as an incredibly valuable leadership development period - and as her evidence shows - as meaningful as any leadership programme or MBA going.
June 2026
Employment Rights Act 2027
What organisations need to know - and do - to support a woman throughout her career and reduce the Gender Pay Gap - including that pesky return to work transition with its long lasting effects, if not managed well.
I learned a lot from Michelle Gyimah - from Equality Pays - about the legislation coming in next year, that not only legally requires all companies (250+) to report their gender pay gap data - but provide an action plan on exactly how they will reduce it.
We discussed the role of coaching for returning mothers as being a tried and tested - and highly successful - intervention that organisations can use to provide the kind of conversation and thinking space women want and need so they can make well informed decisions at this point in their career.
The key take away for me was simple: the world is watching - investors, future applicants, existing employees, customers - are asking questions about what organisations will be doing to create sustainable and viable opportunities during the whole lifecycle of a woman’s career.
Things are changing. Join the conversation.
